-EPW   Bereft of any meaningful vision, political parties have reduced politics to gladiatorial contests. Much was promised of the Lokpal Bill in the winter session of Parliament. While a toothless bill was indeed passed by the Lok Sabha, the United Progressive Alliance (UPA) was unable to have even this endorsed in the Rajya Sabha on the last day of the session. Did this have to do with the inability of the UPA...

A survey in nine States shows that they have quietly revived and expanded their public distribution system. AT a time when the Union Cabinet cleared the draft of the national food security Bill after dilly-dallying over it comes a compelling piece of information: many State governments have quietly revived and expanded the public distribution system in their States. That, at any rate, is one of the main findings of a...

The All India Democratic Women's Association (AIDWA) has called upon Parliament to reject the National Food Security Bill introduced in the Lok Sabha on Thursday. In a statement issued on Friday, the association said the Bill was a “more dangerous and rehashed version” of the current Targeted Public Distribution System, that proved to be an “utter failure” in view of the manner in which it eroded the food security of the...

-PTI The conflict between men and elephants came to the fore once again in Orissa's Ganjam district when wild tuskers trampled to death a 57-year-old man and injured a girl at a village. Dandasi Muduli (57) died on the spot when he was attacked by a herd of wild elephants outside village Biripur yesterday while on way to a pond for a bath. Before the incident, the tuskers had attacked a girl who...

-The Hindu   The government's decision on a sub-quota of 4.5 per cent for minorities within the overall 27 per cent reservation for the backward classes promises to be the new trigger for a heated political discourse just ahead of several Assembly elections, including the all-important poll in Uttar Pradesh just a few months away. More than a decade ago, the V.P. Singh government ushered in the ‘Mandal revolution' in North India. It...